Ajani 2: disappointing

andrewvanmarle

Ajani 2 is kind of disappointing in two areas:

One: ajani can hold only 4  supports at most. White is a very support centric color, (and so is green to a lesser extent), so  4 suppports is very little actually.

two: the energy mechanic for his ultimate has a very limited shelf life: in about 4 months kaladesh will rotate out, meaning that his ult pw power will be curtailed severely. (since you need to make energy with his first two powers and then hit the third as soon as you can after to make any use of energy left)  Maybe a support for the second power that does the same as oath of ajani (+1 at overload) but also gives new energy at a match 2 (like archtitect)

ridfrenzy

I am loving AJ2.  I generate loyalty so fast it is as easy to spam his second ability as it is the first on Nahiri.  The first ability is also very useful to give extra time to pull off your combos in your deck, coupled with his insane HP pool this means you can try to use some of the more crazy cards that take a lot of mana.

I have largely ignored the 3rd ability and energy completely but the first two abilities are still good even if you ignore the energise mechanic.

Furks

This is my deck... It's been doing pretty good, though it's a bit of a one trick pony. Get mana, cast big things. https://imgur.com/a/8kPwF

andrewvanmarle

@Furks

The problem is the standard format that events will follow. so no Bacon, no energise cards, no rishkar, no angel.

Kaladesh will leave the rotation in about 3 to 4 months, and will Ajani 2 still be interesting to play?


@ridfrenzy   I know, but that is like ignoring Arlinn Kords abilities. Not being able to play that third power is a big waste imo


another option would be to have the third power put down a few energy gems by itself, just like Nissa 2 does

Laeuftbeidir

Furks said:

This is my deck... It's been doing pretty good, though it's a bit of a one trick pony. Get mana, cast big things. https://imgur.com/a/8kPwF

And you can do all the work again next week, when you won't be able to use that deck anymore!

I'm not sure about aj2 right now, but there is a big potential in his colors, mostly restricted by the amount of spells and supports he can use

AngelForge

But isn't it the faith of most planeswalker to hit the shelf at a certain point in time?

Since I have all PWs, all mono-colored PWs exept Koth are not used in events anymore.
And I don't think that D3go will look into the old planeswalker because that is bad for business.

James13

Why play as if it's half a year later?  Enjoy what you have currently now.

andrewvanmarle

Because, unlike the cards, the PW's'represent color combinations that you -cannot- access otherwise. unlike paper magic, hwere you just choose which colors you play, and dont even need planeswalkers.

So, making planeswalkers rotation proof is kinda a big thing: especially if the devs expect to sell them again.

shteev

AngelForge said:

Since I have all PWs, all mono-colored PWs exept Koth are not used in events anymore.

I'll play Jace 2 as well... he's not as good as the dual PWs, tho, in particular he's weak to an opponent who plays a Solemn Recruit on every turn.

Szamsziel

Just try to play claustrophobia on every turn....

AngelForge

A claustrophobia spy network?

andrewvanmarle

@AngelForge and @Szamsziel,

Ajani 2 and his viability is the topic here.... (sorry to nazi around, but I think it's'oo important to have the thread diluted)

Szamsziel

You're right.
For me Ajani2 will follow Aerlinn route - useful in narrow situations but mostly due to colors - not abilities. 
Just using 1St ability when needed.

Dologan

There is a lot of acting as if PvP is the only thing there exists or worth considering... Yes, by that metric Aj2 is quite mediocre both due to his mana gains (they could at least have given him a +1 in Red for old times sake!) and his perishable and muted abilities, but for PvE, where Energise should continue to be a thing and where durability is often more valuable, I'm finding him quite a strong option. 

Phase

Ajani has the potential to be a PvE monster with that ult. It only costs 18 loyalty and lasts a long time at level 60. If you are energizing and matching some loyalty gems you can just dynavolt your opponent to death while ignoring their board and maybe occasionally killing a guy. Personally yeah I am not that excited about him (support limit is HARSH) but he definitely has potential to be fun to play and occasionally really good. And the color combo is pretty novel so there's probably some cool things we don't even know about that he can do that no other walker can do yet.

EDHdad

Maybe I haven't found my groove with him, but I agree with the OP.  I'm not enjoying Ajani at all.  What I want to do with these colors is jam a bunch of supports and spells together, and the deck restrictions prevent this.  Also, he is the only green Planeswalker who generates 5 mana on a 3-gem green match.  He gets 7 on white, but how do you flood the board with white?  And if you do, you risk popping the few supports you can put into the deck.

All of his abilities generate energy, but there isn't much in white and green I want to do with energy.  There are some good colorless supports which deal with energy, but the bonkers ones are mythics I don't have and the decent ones have to compete with every other green / white support for the meager 4 deckslots.

By comparison, Ajani I generates 6 on a white match, 5 on a green match, 5 on a red match, 4 on a blue match, 3 on a black match.  Compare with 7,5,3,3,3 for Ajani II.  His abilities can keep the opposition at bay while powering up the Oath, or one of the Oath creatures, or one of the combo cards that can cheat Oath into play.

Plus, Ajani I can put 9 critters, 6 spells or 5 supports into a deck, vs Ajani II's 8,5,4. 

Even without Oath or Pig, any ridiculous thing I want to do with white or colorless, I can do more easily with Ajani I.  Any ridiculous thing I want to do with green usually involves turning all the gems green and profiting from that, but Ajani II has the weakest mana production of any green walker, profits the least from turning all the gems green, and has fewer deck slots available for the type of cards which turn, or profit from turning, all the gems green.

If I want to do stupid things with energy, I'd rather do it in red-white than green-white, but maybe that's a card availability issue.  I suspect not, though.

And the first ability?  Gain 9 life?  From the walker with the highest starting total in history?  It's really only relevant if you're getting beaten down by your opponent because you don't have enough slots in your deck for the spells and supports which prevent the beatdown, and you don't have enough mana to power up the removal.

At least, that's been my experience so far.  Your mileage may vary.

madwren

I haven't played with AJ2 outside of TG, in which I'm using an aggro build because, well, that's what I do. I admit I was disappointed with his design, however, because it's so far removed from the actual planeswalker card. His abilities there:

+2: Reveal the top three cards of your library. Put all nonland permanent cards revealed this way into your hand and the rest on the bottom of your library in any order.

−2: Exile target creature. Its controller gains life equal to its power.

−9: Put five +1/+1 counters on each creature you control and five loyalty counters on each other planeswalker you control.

Those are all fine, and easily translatable into useful abilities. This is where their forcing of planned obsolescence fails--it takes interesting planeswalkers and either limits them or makes them bland.

Lifegain is only valuable when it's persistent, every-turn damage mitigation. Single shots of lifegain are generally irrelevant. Imagine if the first ability was an Ob-like ability that had an effect such as Pick one card from the first 3 cards in your Library and Fetch it. The next 2 cards in your Library are moved to the bottom of your Library.

Imagine if the second ability was removal, just as described. In the Standard environment that's losing a lot of removal, that would be awesome. It would really make A2 an intriguing play.

Imagine if the ultimate was a "give all your creatures +10/+10" backbreaker that helps you win games rather than not lose.

I donno. It's just that all of those seem a lot more exciting--and it's not like I made up some crazy/random set of abilities to make him overpowered. I just read the tinykitty card.

Dsagent

I enjoy ajani although I wish the mana was not so harsh.

ridfrenzy

andrewvanmarle :

@ridfrenzy   I know, but that is like ignoring Arlinn Kords abilities. Not being able to play that third power is a big waste imo


another option would be to have the third power put down a few energy gems by itself, just like Nissa 2 does

So arlinn was my favorite PW and I never used her 3rd ability.  I used her 2nd more or less 100% off the time to churn out Ulrichs.

Ajani2 is now my favorite, but I am using a deck with 8 mythics and it is just stupidly fun to play.

wereotter

andrewvanmarle said:

@Furks

The problem is the standard format that events will follow. so no Bacon, no energise cards, no rishkar, no angel.

Kaladesh will leave the rotation in about 3 to 4 months, and will Ajani 2 still be interesting to play?


@ridfrenzy   I know, but that is like ignoring Arlinn Kords abilities. Not being able to play that third power is a big waste imo


another option would be to have the third power put down a few energy gems by itself, just like Nissa 2 does

I think your timetable for set rotation is wrong. Amonkhet comes out next week, Kaladesh will still be around. The paper release of Hour of Devestation comes out in July. This is a small set added to Amonkhet, so Kaladesh will likely stay.

the release date for the next set hasn't been announced but we can assume it will be around October, meaning Kaladesh will likely rotate out sometime in early November. You've still got another 6 months before Ajani is just useful for his colors and for energize in PvE events. Remember you can continue to use whatever cards you want in those. 

Edit:

I agree with you assessment of Arlinn for PvP but add to that you also can't use her second ability since you'll have no werewolves to tutor. I think they could change her so her second ability fetches your next human, wolf, or werewolf and she'd still be flavorful but useful, and her third buff those same creature types. 

andrewvanmarle

Oj, so it may be 6 months not 4. But i counted the past  releases for my calvulation and i came with this. 
Purposefully planning for obsolete PW's is just a **** move.... 

Anyway i still think he should be allowed more supports for one. 

@ridfrenzy try something without pig and deploy. And see where it leaves you.